El Principio - The Beginning...

I turn on the TV in our house. It seems that New York is experiencing record high temperatures approaching triple digits. I have spent six days now under the dictatorship of Don Heat and his advisor Don Humidity in the Dominican Republic. I cannot help but feel cheated; my one-up stories for spending the summer locked in a sauna that has short-circuited begin to fade away. I open my computer and I read the temperature of La Romana... 88 degrees, nothing like the "feels like 98 degrees" in New York. But then I read further... The phrase "It feels like" catches my attention: 101 degrees Fahrenheit. It seems I still have three degrees in my favor...

Despite the feeling that a warm, moist blanket is slowly suffocating me and the fact that after a shower I cannot tell if the I am wiping off more water or more sweat, there is something else that predominates in the air, something that allows me to tolerate this heat and stifling humidity, something that I think the Dominicans in New York have been trying to explain to me for this past year: there is something magical in the air that makes this place enchanting.

The Dominican Republic is a beautiful and unique country. Despite the stifling heat, most people continue wearing pants. In fact, the mode of dress in this country, at least in La Romana, coincides greatly with the perception of who you are. If you dress in shorts, sunglasses, and carry a camera around, well you definitely will be labeled as a tourist; if you wear speedos on the beach, you are probably European. (Contrastingly, most Dominican men wear there T-shirts into the water, a style that will not be appearing anytime soon on Cosmo's acceptable list of appropriate items to wear to the beach.) And no matter how hard I try to blend in, there's no escaping the fact that I will still be a gringo (foreigner/white person).

Nevertheless, trying to sum up the Dominican Republic in a few words is a great injusticia. The reality is, this county has too much culture, too much riqueza, and definitely too many nights of bachata, merengue, and salsa to do it any justice en pocas palabras. So instead, if you're willing, let me take you on a journey through streets were "motos" (small, rambunctious motorcycles) with as many as five people on them dominate the streets; where mangos, avocados, passionfruit, soursop (guanábana), etc., grow in your backyard; where poverty clashes with prosperity; and where the language is rapid, the culture rich, and the food always delicious. 

And, at the end of this journey, perhaps, just maybe, you'll see why this place is so...

...magical.